Means for discharging bulk material from boxcars



Feb. 1, 1955 A. R. PAIDILLE 2,701,073 7 MEANS FOR DISCHARGING BULK MATERIAL FROM BOXCARS Filed May 11, 1953 5 Sheets-Sheet l ZS-nventor ALBERT R PAD/ALE I attorney A. R. PADILLE Feb. 1, 1955 MEANS FOR DISCHARGING BULK MATERIAL FROM BOXCARS 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed May 11, 1953 Flii Al. I

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Zhwentor Gttorneg A. R. PADILLE Feb. I, 1955 MEANS FOR DISCHARGING BULK MATERIAL FROM BOXCARS Filed May 11, 1953 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 it! K ll-5:55?!3:115:35

(Ittorneg United States Patent MEANS FOR DISCHARGING BULK MATERIAL FROM BOXCARS Albert R. Padille, Long Beach, Calif.

Application May 11, 1953, Serial No. 354,117

1 Claim. (Cl. 214-521) This invention relates to means for discharging bulk material from relatively large enclosed containers, of which railroad box cars are preferred examples. The material contemplated to be handled by the present invention is of granular, comminuted, or pellet form or even pulverized, and, more particularly, feed or grain, salt, flour, sugar, chemicals, dry concentrates, or other materials in dry bulk form.

An object of the present invention is to provide a bulk container, such as a box car, with conveyor means to discharge bulk material therefrom either below the level of the bottom of said container or above the level of the top thereof, as desired.

Another object of the invention is to provide novel and improved conveyor means of the drag type to accomplish bulk material discharge as above.

A further object of the invention is to provide a box car with a drag conveyor means that is arranged to either discharge bulk material from one end of said car, or dis charge such material laterally above the top of said car, as desired.

A still further object of the invention is to provide con veyor means of the character indicated which will effect complete discharge of all of the contents of a box car whether the discharge is at the end of the car or at a point above the top thereof.

A still further object of the invention is to provide a container or box car that is compartmented to enable separation, one from the other, of different types of bulk material, and to convey and discharge, as indicated above, the materials in the compartments, selectively.

A still further object is to provide gate means that control feed from the different compartments, said means also constituting a barrier to flow of material to the conveyor means until the same is opened and, thereby, substantially reducing the resistance to movement of said conveyor means by eliminating an undue weight of material thereon. Therefore, the conveyor means can be made substantially lighter and less costly than if the entire weight of the material in the container were on the conveyor.

The invention also has for its objects to provide such means that are positive in operation, convenient in use, easily installed in a Working position and easily disconnected therefrom, economical of manufacture, relatively simple, and of general superiority and serviceability.

The invention also comprises novel details of construction and novel combinations and arrangements of parts, which will more fully appear in the course of the following description. However, the drawings merely show and the following description merely describes embodiments of the present invention, which are given by way of illustration or example only.

In the drawings, like reference characters designate similar parts in the several views.

Fig. 1 is a longitudinal sectional view of a railroad box car provided with bulk material discharge means according to the present invention.

Fig. 2 is an enlarged broken and fragmentary plan view of the conveyor means as seen with the top of the box car removed.

Fig. 3 is a cross-sectional view as taken on line 3-3 of Fig. 1, the view being shown at a scale between the scales of Figs. 1 and 2.

Fig. 4 is a longitudinal sectional view of a laterallydischarging boom conveyor used in the invention and drawn to the scale of Fig. 3.

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Fig. 5 is a further enlarged cross-sectional view of said boom as taken on line 5-5 of Fig. 4.

Fig. 6 is an enlarged fragmentary sectional view of the lower right corner of the car shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 7 is a fragmentary cross-sectional view of a box car body provided with a modified form of the invention.

Fig. 8 is a fragmentary longitudinal sectional view in which the right portion is taken on line 8a-8a of Fig. 7 and the left portion on line 8b8b of the same figure.

Referring to the drawings in greater detail and particularly to Figs. 1 to 6, a railroad box car 10 is provided with a primary or body discharging conveyor 11, means 12 to drive said conveyor, a secondary discharging conveyor or boom conveyor 13, and drive means 14 for said boom conveyor. The car is provided with an end discharge 15 which, when open, discharges material fed by conveyor 11. When said discharge 15 is closed, the material is automatically fed by conveyor 11 to the boom conveyor.

The box car 10 is shown as an enclosed container body 16 having the general rectangular form and size of conventional box cars, said body, in the usual manner, being mounted on a wheel-borne chassis 17 so that the same may travel on rails 18. It will be realized that the box car shown is exemplary also of a vehicle adapted to be driven or towed on a roadway, in which case, the same may be of smaller size than is conventional for box cars.

The body 10 that is shown, while otherwise conventional, has a top 19 that is provided, on each side of the longitudinal center thereof, with a plurality of hatches 20 that are fitted with removable covers 21, and with oppositely sloping hopper walls 22 that cooperate with the side walls 23 of the body to direct bulk material in said body toward the longitudinal middle of the bottom 24 of said body. Fig. 3, at 25, indicates bulk material and shows the hopper form of the interior of body 10.

The primary or body conveyor preferably comprises a pair of similar chains 26 that are connected by a set of uniformly spaced plates 27 which have an overall length to be accommodated in a longitudinal trough 28 defined by bottom 24 and side walls 29 that connect said bottom and sloping walls 22. At one end of said trough, the chains are trained around sprocket wheels 30 that are driven by the means 12 and, at the other end of said trough, the chains are trained around idler sprocket wheels 31 and then extend upwardly against the end wall 32 of the car body 16. Thus, conveyor 11 has a horizontal lower run 33 in trough 28 and a vertical run 34 at one end. The latter run is enclosed in a housing 35 that serves to prevent dislodgement from plates 27 of conveyor 11 of material that is being borne upwardly as the conveyor moves in the direction indicated.

At the upper end of the vertical run 34, the chains 26 are trained around idler sprocket wheels 36 and then extend horizontally beneath top 19 of body 16 as an upper horizontal run 37. To the position of boom conveyor 13,

the same being shown midway of the ends of the body,

said run 37 is enclosed in a housing 38, that has the same purpose as housing 35, and terminates in a material-discharging end 38a that is located above the intake of the boom conveyor. The remainder of conveyor run 37 is uncovered.

The opposite end of run 37 is trained around sprocket wheels 39 which are preferably carried by means 40 that take up slack in the conveyor. Finally, from sprocket wheels 39, the chains 26 extend downward as a vertical run 41 that connects with the lower horizontal run 33. Thus, the conveyor 11 is endless and drags material in trough 28 toward end wall 32 and outward of discharge 15 when the same is open. When said discharge is closed, the plates 27 elevate the material along the vertical run 34 and then drag said material along the upper run 37 to be discharged at end 38a of the housing 38 of the latter run.

The means 12 may comprise any suitable prime mover such as an engine or motor 42 of which the sprocket wheels 30 comprise the output. Said engine or motor may be suitably housed to obviate the material 25 coming in contact therewith.

The secondary or boom conveyor 13, when not in use, is housed or supported by a transverse support 43 dis posed beneath the discharge end 38a. While support 43 is shown as an open-topped channel member, the same may be fabricated in various ways providing at least the ends of the boom conveyor are supported thereby, when said conveyor is in travel or out-of-use position, and the intake end of said conveyor is supported, when the same is in operative position.

The boom conveyor 13 comprises an elongated housing 44 having a top-open inlet 45 at one end and a preferably downwardly directed outlet 46 at the other. An endless drag conveyor chain 47, provided with drag plates 48, extends along housing 44 and is trained over sprocket wheels 49 and 50, one at each end of the housing. The former sprocket wheel is mounted on a shaft 51 that has its ends extending laterally outward of housing 44. As best seen in Fig. 5, housing 44 has a block of I cross-sectional form so as to provide ledges 52 along which the plates 48 of the upper run of chain 47 drag material introduced into inlet 45 to convey such material to the outlet 46.

Fig. 3 shows the operative position of the boom conveyor with the same extending through a hatch 20 laterally of body 16 and above the top 19 of said body.

Consequently, when power is applied to shaft 51 to cause 7 chain 47 to move in the direction of the arrow in Fig. 4,

the boom conveyor will discharge bulk material fed thereto by conveyor 11. While the boom conveyor is shown as extending toward the left, the same may, optionally, be extended through the hatch 20 at the right.

The drive means 14 for said boom conveyor is shown 1 as being taken from the shafts 53 on which the pairs of sprocket wheels 36 and 39 are mounted. While the drive is shown as taken from both shafts, only one may be provided, as best seen in Fig. 2. The drive 14 that is shown comprises an elongated longitudinally disposed 5 splined coupling sleeve 59 in separable coupling engage- I ment with the splined end 60 of shaft 54. Suitable bearings 61 may support the drive thus provided from the body top 19.

Variations of this drive 14 may be used, provided the same permit of being uncoupled from shaft 51 as perrnitted by retractable coupling sleeve 59 of the drive that is shown.

The discharge 15 at the end of the car body is best seen in Fig. 6 and is shown as an opening 62 in the lower end of wall 32 controlled by a gate 63 that may be raised or lowered, as desired, by suitable gearing 64.

Referring now to the form of the invention shown in Figs. 7 and 8, the box car body 16 is divided by transverse Walls or bulkheads 65 that divide the same into compartments 66. A hatch 20, on each side, provides openings in each compartment through which the different compartments may be filled either with the same or different bulk materials. The hopper walls 22 may be stiffened by bracing gussets 67 that are shown as aligned with walls 65. The discharging conveyor 11 is similar to the one disclosed with respect to the earlier-described form of the invention and, while Figs. 7 and 8 do not show the boom conveyor 13, the same is provided as before.

According to the invention, the throat of the hopper, in each said compartment, is controlled by a gate 68 that is operated by manual means, such as a handwheel 69, through the medium of suitable gearing 70. Said gate is preferably arranged to move transversely, as shown, and access is afforded to said handwheel by an opening 71 in side wall 23 of the box car body. The width of gate 68 is made to be most practicable relative to the width of the compartment it controls so that all or substantially all of the material in said compartment will gravitationally fall onto conveyor means 11 in trough 28.

It will be realized that gates 68 constitute removable bottom walls for the hopper which, when closed, bear the weight of the bulk material thereabove, leaving the conveyor means 11 without load except that of the material from the compartment that has its gate open.

While I have illustrated and described what I now contemplate to be the best mode of carrying out my invention, the constructions are, of course, subject to modification without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. It is, therefore, not desired to restrict the invention to the particular forms of construction illustrated and described, but to cover all modifications that may fall within the scope of the appended claim.

Having thus described the invention, what I claim and desire to be secured by Letters Patent is:

In combination, a box car having a generally rectangular bulk material-holding body having a lower end opening and at least one upper opening, a drag conveyor encircling the interior of said body and having a portion directed to discharge material through said opening, means to close said opening, a discharge for said conveyor intermediate the ends of the body and disposed in the upper part of the body for material carried by the drag conveyor, when the mentioned opening is closed, means to drive said conveyor in a direction to discharge bulk material in the body through said end opening and to discharge material from said discharge of the conveyor, when said end opening is closed, a boom conveyor having an inlet end and an outlet end and having an operative position with its inlet end beneath the discharge of the drag conveyor, extending through said body opening, and the outlet end outward of the body, a separable drive interconnecting the drag and boom conveyors to drive the latter from the former, and a transverse support within the body beneath the mentioned discharge of the drag conveyor to support the boom conveyor when uncoupled from said separable drive and retracted to a position entirely within the body.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 669,876 Critchlow Mar. 12, 1901 1,222,337 Stuart Apr. 10, 1917 2,190,724 McBride Feb. 20, 1940 2,573,193 Goldsberry Oct. 30, 1951 

